Home

Friday, April 1, 2011

Kalemat by Arabian Oud - FiFi Award 2010

Kalemat by Arabian Oud is an unisex fragrance inspired by the smell of bakhoor. Bakhoor (Arabic بخور) is the Arabic name given to woodchips soaked in fragrant oils or in most Arab countries it is the name given to scented bricks. These scented chips/bricks are burned in incense burners to perfume the home and clothing with a rich thick smoke. The ingridients of bakhoor are mostly agarwood (oud), sandlewood, frankincense and other natural oils in different mixtures.
At my first visit to UAE I actually deeply fell in love with the exotic smell of bakhoor which you can smell almost everywhere.

Kalemat is the fragrance which won the FiFi Award 2010 in Dubai for the most popular perfume of the year. The significance of the award is represented in the fact it is the first online consumer voting within the region to choose their favourite perfume within the Arab World.

So beside my love for bakhoor it made me even more curious to test this popular perfume. And indeed it captured me though it is not as good as the real bakhoor smell.
Unfortunately I noticed later that it just doesn't work on my skin. I didn't test it extensively and not on my own skin. I should have know it better, as I noticed couple of times in the past that my skin is not on friendly terms with frankincence as it is getting to be too herbal.

So I personally will stay true to bakhoor and when I want to smell of it I will scent my clothes exposing to the smoke of bakhoor like many Arabs do. I always claim that in fact I am probably Arab, kidnapped and brought to Europe and given time I adopted to the surrounding conditions by getting blond :-D